[1] The operation was discovered by the Soviet Union in 1980, when NSA analyst Ronald Pelton defected and revealed the existence of the program.
During the Cold War, the United States wanted to learn more about Soviet submarine and missile technology, specifically ICBM test and nuclear first strike capability.
Despite these obstacles, the potential for an intelligence coup was considered too great to ignore, and in October 1971, the United States sent the purpose-modified submarine USS Halibut deep into the Sea of Okhotsk.
[2]: 188 Eventually, more taps were installed on Soviet lines in other parts of the world, with more advanced instruments built by AT&T's Bell Laboratories that were radioisotope thermoelectric generator-powered and could store a year's worth of data.
With only a few hundred dollars in the bank, Pelton walked into the Soviet embassy in Washington, D.C. in January 1980, and offered to sell what he knew to the KGB for money.
[1] As of 1999[update], the recording device captured by the Soviets was on public display at the Great Patriotic War museum in Moscow.